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Easing the Pain of Doing Your Taxes

Accountants come up with inventive ways to make tax season fun, or at least tolerable

By

Anne Kadet

Feb. 19, 2016 6:00 a.m. ET

Shane Mason and Lizzie Falkner sat laughing in a cozy leather booth in the back of Yours Sincerely, a dimly lit cocktail bar in Brooklyn’s Bushwick neighborhood. He was sporting shaggy blond hair and artsy spectacles; she wore a tank top and striped leggings. It looked like a date—except for the pile of W-2s stacked beside Mr. Mason’s laptop. He was doing her taxes.

“It’s just a withholding issue,” he consoled his client after calculating how much she owed the IRS. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”